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Tony Swan drove this Ferrari Mondial 3600 miles from New Jersey to L.A. in 1981, and lost count of the number of times he got asked what it was, what it would do, and how much it cost. He didn’t go over 135 mph once, though.

IT SEEMED A GOOD IDEA AT THE TIME Motor Trend photographer John Kiewicz figured driving his barn-find ’57 Chevy Bel-Air back from Georgia to California, taking in the remaining stretches of the Mother Road, Route 66, would make a great story. It did, despite a recalcitrant Powerglide and recurring vaporlock.

ON THE WALL OF DEATH
Editor-in-chief Angus MacKenzie persuaded Dodge brass to ship a new Challenger to Europe for a 3000-mile roadtrip. Then he persuaded them to call up their buddies at Mercedes and ask if he could drive it on the famous vertical track at Benz’s Stuttgart proving ground.

THE LONG AND WINDING ROAD
This is Italy’s famous Stelvio Pass, and the narrow ribbon of tarmac that writhes up its north side features 48 hairpin turns. So naturally, we took a Cadillac there. Not just any Cadillac, though, but a ruby-red, 443-horsepower XLR-V-with the 155-mph electronic speed limiter disabled. That’s because getting to the Stelvio Pass involved traveling on a lot of German autobahns, and we felt it might be fun to surprise the odd Porsche 911 or two along the way. We never saw a 911. But we did see an indicated 171 mph on the A63 autobahn near Mainz.

BRAVE HEART
You could call it the definition of optimism: In 1978, freelance writer Ro McGonegal was invited to join the Motor Trend staff, and he decided to drive from New Jersey to California in a Jaguar XJ6L fitted with the then newfangled Lucas fuel-injection system and catalytic converters. This time, though, the Prince of Darkness stayed in his lair. “Everything that I’d imagined could go wrong with this car just hasn’t happened,” McGonegal wrote, though he did complain of mysterious vibrations from the tires. He clearly hadn’t imagined that.

THUNDER ROAD
American icons don’t come more, well, iconic than this. A Shelby GT500 poses in Monument Valley, Utah, during a 3479-mile road trip from Los Angeles to New York that included a 157-mph blast on a proving-ground track in Arizona, climbing to 11,158 feet in Colorado, and a stop at Indianapolis Motor Speedway, before finishing at the site of the 1964 New York World’s Fair, where the original Mustang made its debut.

SEE THE USA IN YOUR CHEVROLET
Was Chevy‘s 2008 Malibu tough enough to take on America? To find out, we took one on an 11,306-mile jaunt that touched the northern, eastern, southern, and western extremities of the lower 48 states, with a swing through Lebanon, Kansas, in the center for good measure. The short answer was yes: The Malibu proved a quiet, competent, and comfortable tourer. And we saw an awful lot of this great country.

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